1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to managing rentals of personal property, and particularly, to an Internet-based method and system for renting furniture and housewares in connection with the rental of real estate. The invention is particularly suited for the high-volume, commercial real estate/rental industry.
2. Description of the Related Art
Real estate rental agents routinely rent furniture and household goods to customers who also rent apartments. “Real estate rental agents”, as used herein, refers to a residential property management company, a corporate housing company, or any other party who leases or arranges to lease real estate to another party. Residential property management companies typically lease real estate only, while corporate housing companies serve as consolidators in supplying bundled properties and services to corporations for short-term leases. A corporate housing company, for example, packages an apartment with furniture, housewares, and services such as cable TV, electric, Internet, and maid service.
The process of renting furniture and household goods for rental real estate is largely manual, labor intensive, and rife with errors. A typical transaction begins when a prospective real estate occupant expresses to a real estate rental agent an interest in renting real estate with accompanying rental furnishings and housewares. The real estate rental agent must then place a phone call to a furniture and housewares supplier. The person taking the order consults paper catalogs of household furnishings as well as paper copies of price listings in order to inform the real estate rental agent of the price for renting the desired items. Because the process is manual and especially complex when demand is high, human error can occur so that prices are routinely quoted wrong and totaled wrong.
When agents fax orders to suppliers, they must also phone the supplier to confirm that the fax was received and to verify the specifics of the order. Otherwise, suppliers must confirm the agents' orders by fax or by phone. The supplier often gives the rental agent a confirmation number over the phone, the agent writes down the number, and then the supplier and the agent may also enter the confirmation number into a computer. The offices of agents and suppliers are filled with stacks of faxes and manila folders containing order confirmations. Goods are misidentified and the wrong furniture and furnishings are delivered, often to the wrong address. Opportunities for errors abound, and mistakes are common.
The industry cries out for automation. Unfortunately, none of the prior art satisfies the need, as will be evident in the prior art cited below. Although other inventions use the Internet to rent property and household goods, none is designed for the commercial real estate-rental market, and none solves the multiple problems addressed by the present invention.
U.S. Publication No. 2002/0046213, published Apr. 18, 2002, discloses a method for managing rentals of real estate and personal property items over a data communications network. The invention is not designed for commercial use. Instead, it operates on a flea-market model. Individuals rent their own real estate and personal property. Nor can the Vinati invention maintain and manage catalogs of furniture and housewares provided by commercial suppliers.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,016,504, issued Jan. 18, 2000 to Arnold et al., discloses a design for a Web page that integrates multiple vendors into one shopping place. The invention is not designed for commercial use or for any rental market. The Arnold invention, like the Vinati invention, is designed for the general public. There is no way to display and maintain a catalog of rental goods.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,285,986, issued Sep. 4, 2001 to Christopher C. Andrews, discloses a method for interactive, automated registration, negotiation, and marketing for combining products and services from one or more vendors. The Andrews invention uses the Internet, but again, is intended for the general public, and cannot satisfy the needs of the commercial real estate-rental and corporate housing industry. Prices are shown directly to customers, and are not kept confidential. The Andrews invention contains no provision for order confirmation.
In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, access to a Web-based furniture catalog containing restricted information is controlled by Internet Protocol address recognition. Techniques for configuring access control based on Internet Protocol recognition are well-known in the art and described in numerous publications, including Stein, John F., How to Set Up and Maintain a Web Site 190–193. Massachusetts: Addison Wesley Longman, Inc., 1997 and Yeager, Nancy J. et al., Web Server Technology 284–286. San Francisco: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc., 1996.
The present invention, by contrast, eliminates the manual process of renting real estate together with furniture and housewares, and meets an unfilled need in the industry. None of the above inventions and patents, taken either singly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed. Thus a business process for the rental of furniture and housewares solving the aforementioned problems is desired.